Simplicity Vs. Overwhelming

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The mid 1800s brought about new typography and fonts which in turn increased demand for advertisement posters. Often times when new inventions and choices come about people tend to go a little overboard with options. I feel this happened with vaudeville and circus posters in the mid 1800s.

A few years ago I worked in a business card design center. I asked a co-worker for advice on a business card I designed and he said that mixing serif and sans-serif font does not look right. The round fonts vs. the fonts with feet. When I look at vaudeville posters I see an overwhelming mix of fonts styles.

The above poster used several different styles of font as well as sizes.  It also has color and images.  Meggs History of Graphic Design states; "

-->access to a nearly infinite range of typographic sizes, styles, weights, and novel ornamental effects, and the design philosophy was to use it."  This idea is shown in most vaudeville and circus poster of this era.  Another example is shown below. 

Today the idea is to use fonts to capture the  attention of the viewer but not to overwhelm them.  Type styles can be very aesthetic if used in the right way.  The design above also shows the use of text forming various paths across the poster.  The posters in the mid 1800s used many different type styles to capture the viewers attention as well and emphasis certain points over others.  Below is a current example of a circus poster.  

The above modern poster uses all sans-serif style fonts and the visual layout is much more aesthetically pleasing to the eye.  The text is centered and lined up straight on the page.  The use of color is appropriate and not overwhelming.  The image at the top catches attention but also does not take away from the rest of the page.

Graphic design has come along way since the 1800s but both styles are fun in their own way.  I still think the the modern carnival poster design still shows some essence of the 1800s style while also being cleaner and less visually overwhelming than the others.  I look forward to seeing how graphic design changes in the future!